On your marks...

So, with just two days left of school, I'm wondering at what point the reality of the situation is all going to kick in.  To a certain extent, I don't think reality will dawn until September - when I am tucked away in Rwanda and everyone else has gone back to Grey Coat.  Still not sure if I'll have a cry on Friday - I don't really like goodbyes (especially big public ones) and because it does not seem real, I think maybe I will be OK.  I had a moment at the Abbey Service a couple of weeks ago - my throat caught during the singing of "I the Lord of Sea and Sky".  Oh dear.

I had a nice day at London Zoo today with my tutor group (well - 17 of them as the rest are on a trip to Germany).  I had to give 5 of them the "disappointed" lecture about ten minutes into the trip and reminded them that today would leave me with some final memories of them and it would be awful if they were unhappy ones.  So they rose to the challenge magnificently and even afforded me the opportunity to have a cup of coffee and a sugary snack when I was flagging in the afternoon.  Two of them also supplied me with super sour and sugary sweets to keep me going.  We saw just about everything you can possibly see at London Zoo and it didn't rain until we got on the coach to leave.  Fab.

I'm still busy with all my preparations.  I've handed in my notice on the flat and have almost done all my VSO paperwork.  Just need to pack the flat up and go I suppose.  It struck me today that my entire annual salary from VSO is only just over half of one months pay from my current job.  Is it any wonder that people have such difficult lives in other countries?  We have no idea how lucky we are, really and I hope that I gain perspective on that when I am away.

Every journey begins with a single step...

So here's one of the first steps on my journey to being a VSO volunteer.  There is still a lot to do before I depart for Rwanda at the beginning of September, but it's taken a while to even get this far.

I thought that starting to write my blog may make it all seem a bit more real and may focus my attentions in the right direction.  I only have three more weeks left at work and then I will have six weeks to pack up and finally sort myself out in preparation to leave for two years.  It's all quite daunting but also hugely exciting.  It will be sad to leave GCH but the challenges that lie ahead will give me something to really get my teeth stuck into and I can imagine that although I will be shattered and over-whelmed at times, it's going to be incredibly rewarding.

The journey so far, then:  I applied for VSO in December 2009.  I had my selection day in April 2010 and then it took until September 2010 to get my references sorted out!  So, finally the wheels were fully in motion and I got offered my placement at the start of this year.  I have attended both online and face-to-face courses with VSO, I've had my medical and dental checks and I've started the process of getting vaccinated - thankfully I have most of them as I've done a bit of travelling, but I still have to have 7 more to complete the process!

I'm persevering with the online learning of Kinyarwanda - I have a very small handful of words so far (hello/goodbye/thankyou/how are you/my name is Alice), but it will get better once I have to use it everyday (I hope!).  Perhaps setting up this blog is just one more way to procrastinate...